Old Globe to produce world premiere of 'Bright Star' in September

Funny story: The comedy icon and serious banjo devotee Steve Martin has a new stage musical - and it’s headed for a world premiere in San Diego.

The Old Globe is announcing today that “Bright Star,” the bluegrass-laced musical by Martin and the singer-songwriter Edie Brickell, will debut at the Balboa Park theater Sept. 13, running through Nov. 2 on the Donald and Darlene Shiley Stage.

The show is based on Martin and Brickell’s original story about a soldier who returns to his North Carolina home after World War II, and finds his life intertwined with that of a woman who heads a famous literary journal.

“As soon as I read it, I said, ‘OK, we’re in,’” said Barry Edelstein, the theater’s artistic director, whose long working relationship with Martin was instrumental in landing the project. “I can’t tell you how proud I am that the Globe will be producing this.”

The Globe debut of “Bright Star” doesn’t come as a complete surprise: Martin talked about the prospect at the Grammy Awards in January, shortly after he and Brickell won a Grammy for their song “Love Has Come For You” (from their album of the same name).

The theater also produced a workshop of the musical last month in New York (following an initial workshop staging at Vassar College in upstate New York).

That kind of developmental step often signals a show with Broadway potential, and the Globe has had a hand in more than 20 shows that have gone to Broadway over the years, including the now-running musical “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder,” a critically acclaimed piece that is a prime candidate for Tony Award nominations this year.

But for now the focus is getting the world-premiere production on its feet in San Diego, under the direction of the Broadway veteran Walter Bobbie, a Tony Award winner (“Chicago”) who will be making his Globe debut.

The show headlines a just-announced 2014-15 Globe season that also includes productions of "The Royale" (Oct. 4 to Nov. 2); "Murder for Two" (Jan. 24 to March 1, 2015); "The Twenty-Seventh Man" (Feb. 14 to March 15, 2015); "The White Snake" (March 21 to April 26, 2015); "Buyer and Cellar" (April 4 to May 3, 2015); "Arms and the Man" (May 9 to June 14, 2015); and one additional production to be announced; plus the return of the holiday favorite "Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" (Nov. 15 to Dec. 27).

Martin was not immediately available for an interview, but in a Globe-provided statement, he said (presumably not quite with a straight face) that the fact the musical “is premiering at the wonderful Old Globe in San Diego where Shakespeare first performed his plays fills me with humility.”

Brickell said in the same statement that “after visiting the Globe, I realize how lucky I am to be a part of a production there. I cannot wait to see ‘Bright Star’ rise and shine at the gorgeous Old Globe.”

Martin is officially credited as book writer on the show, with Brickell as lyricist; they composed the music jointly.

The Globe’s Edelstein has worked on four previous theater projects with Martin over the past two decades, including commissioning the comedian and writer’s play “The Underpants” for off-Broadway’s Classic Stage Co. in 2002.

When Martin was writing the score to the Public Theater’s 2012 production of “As You Like It” (which Edelstein produced as head of that company’s Shakespeare Initiative), he mentioned he was working on an early version of “Bright Star.”

Edelstein eventually became the first person to read the new piece. Initially most of the music was from Martin and Brickell’s “Love Has Come For You” album, but now only four or five of the show’s 25 numbers are from the recording.

Still, “if you’ve listened to the album, you know the flavor of the music,” Edelstein said. “It’s got this roots-music influence to it, but they’re really doing something different — they’re doing much more a kind of pop sound,” with elements of folk, bluegrass and show tunes woven in.

“It’s really remarkable and beautiful. And it’s certainly funny ­— you wouldn’t expect it to be a Steve Martin piece if it weren’t funny.

“But funny isn’t really the first thing it is. It’s actually very sweet. It’s just hugely big-hearted, and funny along the way, and also very moving. I think it’s wonderful, and I’m so looking forward to it.”

The show is set in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains, and moves back and forth between 1923 and 1945. It tells dual stories: One of a young man named Billy Cane, who returns from the war to pursue his dream of being a writer; and the other of Alice Murphy, the editor of a Southern literary journal who has a secret past.

As the story unfolds, their lives “overlap in surprising ways,” Edelstein said.

The production's cast will number about 20, plus an onstage bluegrass band augmented by orchestral elements. (Edelstein stressed that while both Martin and Brickell will be in San Diego to work on “Bright Star,” neither will appear in the show.)

Martin is still revered for his epic comedy exploits of the 1970s, which evolved into a Hollywood career with hit films from “The Jerk” to “Roxanne” to “Father of the Bride.”

But he’s also an accomplished playwright and essayist, and has been a musician and banjo aficionado since his youth.

“Love Has Come For You” was his first teaming with Brickell, the singer-songwriter (and wife of fellow musician Paul Simon) who gained fame in the late ’80s with the hit song “What I Am,” recorded with her band the New Bohemians.

Tickets for "Bright Star" and the rest of the season are available only by subscription for now; no public sale date has been set. More details and subscription purchase: (619) 234-5623 or theoldglobe.org.